Authors

Kerstin Kreibohm
- Hearing Center of the ENT clinic of the Medical University of Hannover, Germany

Stephanie Ruehl
- Hearing Center of the ENT clinic of the Medical University of Hannover, Germany

Thomas Lenarz
- Hearing Center of the ENT clinic of the Medical University of Hannover, Germany

German Society of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology, Head and Neck Surgery.
81st Annual Meeting of the German Society of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology, Head and Neck Surgery.
Wiesbaden,
12.-16.05.2010.
DÃ¼sseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2010. Doc10hno039

Outline

Some studies show, that present cochlear-implant-systems may convey certain musical elements better than previous generations. Only a small number of investigations were done to ask the CI users how they assess their musical perception and how they listen to music in everyday life.

50 adult CI users with any generation of Advanced Bionics CI- systems, using the different speech coding strategies (CIS, SAS, PPS, HiRes, HiRes 120) were interviewed with a questionnaire to assess their skills in music perception prior deafness and after implantation. In addition a control group of 35 normal hearing adults was interviewed with an adapted questionnaire.

We found, that HiRes 120 users showed less significant differences in their rating compared to the normal hearing group. Users of the first CI generation showed the most significant differences compared to the normal hearing.

The improved spectral resolution in the last generation of speech coding strategy HiRes 120 seems to enable a better discrimination of the gender of a singer, better identification of musical style, better identification of a solo instrument and better understanding of lyrics of a song. These features seem to be important for listening to music in everyday life.